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Trump Administration Wants To End NASA Funding For ISS By 2025 (theverge.com)
According to budget documents seen by The Verge, the Trump administration is preparing to end support for the International Space Station program by 2025. As a result, American astronauts could be grounded on Earth for years with no destination in space until NASA develops new vehicles for its deep space travel plans. From the report: The draft may change before an official budget request is released on February 12th. However, two people familiar with the matter have confirmed to The Verge that the directive will be in the final proposal. We reached out to NASA for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication. Any budget proposal from the Trump administration will also be subject to scrutiny and approval by Congress. But even announcing the intention to cancel ISS funding could send a signal to NASA's international partners that the U.S. is no longer interested in continuing the program. Many of NASA's partners still have yet to decide if they'd like to continue working on the station beyond 2024. The International Space Station has been an ongoing program for more than two decades. It costs NASA between $3 to $4 billion each year, and represents a more than $87 billion investment from the U.S. government. It's become a major hub for conducting both government and commercial experiments in microgravity, as well as testing out how the human body responds to weightlessness.
The ISS mission has exceeded it's original goals and it's far past time to recognize that. To say that it's invaluable to science is nonsense. To say that it is also invaluable to a human mars mission (something that I always thought was kind of stupid any way considering the countless failures we have had sending other spaceships there) is not much better than nonsense. This all has *got* to be a big open secret at NASA.
NASA can finally be unhindered to develope the next generation of propulsion technologies that will be required for any space mission rather than worry about what flavor of bubble gum a handful of Astronauts will need as they check off another orbit done.
I am truly glad that the Trump administration can see that.
Rather than a human mars mission, I much, much rather see us be able to find a way to send another spacecraft to Pluto and have it only need a year to get there.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
You better let the people spending the money decide where the money is being spent. Want to spend money in space, spend it where it will generate more investment in space. Want more money for space, make bigger plans, don't be bloody cowards. How big, shoot for the stars, why the fuck not but make clear each step of the path. So earth orbiting space stations, a permanent moon base, then town, then city, asteroid bases, a mars colony, bases on the other moons and then the stars. How to pay for it, STOP FUCKING KILLING EACH OTHER, it is expensive and achieves fuck all.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Who said that's the best argument for the ISS? Some useful science has come out of the ISS, but enough to justify its cost by itself? NASA has turned into a pork barrel jobs program. If its budget allocation were decided by NASA itself, and put directly into basic research and advancing the state of the art in aerospace tech, they'd get much more interesting things accomplished. The most interesting upcoming mission they have now is the Europa Clipper, with a vague launch window 4-7 years from now. The NASA human mission to Mars is planned for 15 years from now and always will be. I remember "let's send a man to Mars" being part of George W. Bush's reelection campaign promises (not like I believed it). If commercial space companies will only do what's profitable for them, then NASA should do the R&D that's unprofitable: cleaning up space junk, blue skies science, and basic research. In the near future, "hey we have some humans in orbit" is no longer going to be impressive and their normal PR methods won't be able to save the ISS.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.